


The Great Detective

by flawedamythyst



Category: Sherlock (TV), Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-02-01
Updated: 2012-02-01
Packaged: 2017-10-30 11:22:12
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,106
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/331219
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/flawedamythyst/pseuds/flawedamythyst
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Coda to 3.03: The Reichenbach Fall. Sherlock discovers a new favourite book on his travels.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Great Detective

Sherlock didn't know about John's book until the girl sitting opposite him on the train from Cologne to Nuremberg pulled it out of her bag and started reading it. _Der Großartige Detektiv_ read the cover in bold letters, with his own picture below, wearing that awful hat. John's name was printed in far more modest letters at the bottom.

He'd stared for a long moment, unable to control his initial reaction, then covered his reaction as best he could, hoping no one had noticed the uncharacteristic moment from the Australian tourist. He spent the train journey trying to look as little like himself as he could, hoping that his change of hairstyle and wardrobe, along with his lack of a ridiculous hat, would be enough. 

Once at Nuremberg station, he rushed to the first bookshop he could find. 

The book was easy to find. A quick perusal of the chapter titles showed that John had included almost every case he had mentioned on his blog, as well as a handful of others, all of which had been given truly atrocious titles. For a moment he tried to convince himself that the German translator was responsible for at least a couple of the worst puns, but he knew John too well to really believe that.

He flicked through the book and his eyes fell on a sentence of dialogue. 

_“Harry ist die Kurzform von Harriet.”_

He could still remember exactly how John had sounded as he'd said that, so satisfied to be able to prove Sherlock wrong on something, even something as minor as that. They'd barely even known each other then, but he'd never lost his pleasure at being able to call Sherlock out on being wrong. Though, of course, it had happened only a handful of times, and some of those had been incredibly minor.

He turned a few more pages, reading the description of the corpse and remembering how it had felt to have John telling his deductions were brilliant. He'd never stopped doing that, either. 

Reading John's words in German didn't sound right. Sherlock wanted to be able to hear John's voice as he had written it, not filtered through a translator.

“Haben Sie dieses Buch auch auf Englisch?” he asked the man behind the counter.

He didn't, but he knew a shop that did. Sherlock stopped in there on his way to the youth hostel he had resorted to staying in and bought his own copy. After a moment's thought, he bought a German copy as well.

Once he was safely cloistered in his room, he turned to the dedication page and ran his fingers over the simple 'For Sherlock.' Why had he not foreseen that John might do this? It seemed obvious in retrospect – of course he would channel his grief into creating something, trying to cling to the role he had shaped for himself in Sherlock's life.

Sherlock had been avoiding any information on John's welfare, mainly by the simple expedient of not asking Mycroft for any, no matter how tempted he might be. He'd been worried that he'd hear something that would make his current situation even more difficult to endure, but holding this book in his hands, he wondered what else he had missed out on. What else had John been doing to fill the gap that Sherlock's death would have left in his life?

He allowed himself a second of hesitation, then picked up his phone and sent a quick text. _How is the JW situation?_

As that sent, bouncing its way through as many secure networks as Mycroft had been able to include when he'd set the phone up, Sherlock opened the book and started to read.

Over the next few hours, he only paused reading long enough to look at Mycroft's reply, once it had finally found its way to him.

_Pained, but keeping a stiff upper lip._

Sherlock had already gauged that much from the book. John had rewritten the cases that had been on his blog, crafting them more into proper stories instead of just 'we did this and then we did that and then Sherlock was brilliant.' He had left almost all the descriptors of Sherlock's genius in place, which made something in Sherlock's chest give a quiet throb. Sadly, his amusement at Sherlock's ignorance of the solar system had also remained. Was there any need for people to know that?

The stories that hadn't originally been on John's blog were even more interesting to read. John had either remembered far more about the cases than Sherlock would have expected, or he had asked Lestrade for access to the files on them. He'd also included whole sections of conversation between the two of them, which weren't entirely accurate but were close enough to make Sherlock wholeheartedly miss sitting in Baker Street with a cup of tea, sounding out ideas while John added in the occasional, surprisingly useful comment.

John had changed very few details, and those that he had were for obvious reasons. The taxi driver from A Study In Pink, for example, died from a conveniently-timed aneurysm rather than a well-aimed shot from an Army-issue handgun.

The final chapter detailed the events leading up to Sherlock's 'death'. He found it harder to read them than he would have thought, experiencing them from John's point of view, with his grief tingeing his phrasing as if it was still fresh and new.

The final paragraphs were the ones that Sherlock found hardest to read, and when he had finished, there was a cold, hard lump in his chest.

_From the very first day I met Sherlock, people have been questioning why I was friends with him. Having read this book, you might well be wondering the same thing. He was often rude, to me as well as everyone else, and he occasionally did things to me that seem far too cruel to be the act of a friend, but I could never hold that against him, not for long. He believed in uncovering the truth wherever he could, using whatever methods he felt were necessary. The few times he lied or deceived someone, it was only so that a greater truth could be told and I always respected that about him. His occasional overly-brutal fits of honesty and the times he stretched my patience with his antics were almost always the results of that passion to find an answer to everything._

_It was with that in mind that I wrote this last chapter of his life, despite how much easier it would have been to leave him still alive at the end of this book, still solving cases and dragging me into all kinds of insane situations. So much about his death is still unexplained that it would probably have been the better literary choice as well. I can't pretend that this is a case that anyone living has the solution to, and writing it out has been extremely difficult for me. It wouldn't have been the truth to pretend it hadn't happened, though, and he wouldn't have wanted that._

_He was my best friend, and I will probably always miss him. Revealing the truth about him in this book, including the darker spots and the parts he might have preferred me to gloss over, seems like the most fitting tribute I could give him. I hope he would have understood that._

Sherlock sat back and let out a huff of breath. An ode to truth, written in honour of a man who had deceived his best friend in one of the worst ways possible. He recalibrated his predictions for John's probable reaction to finding out that Sherlock was alive after all, and winced to himself. Perhaps this charade had gone too far – no, that was wrong. There was no 'perhaps' in that. It had gone too far the moment John had watched him jump, but that had been unavoidable. Now that so much time had passed, it seemed unlikely that the watch on John was as vigilant as it had once been. If Sherlock could get a message through to him, it might relieve some of the pain that had been obvious between every line of his book, or at least turn it into a different kind of suffering. John had always coped better with rage than sorrow.

He put the idea to one side to be ruminated on. He couldn't risk being hasty about this, not when it might be John's life in the balance. There were good reasons for why he had taken this course of action, after all. 

He spent the next few days scouring the criminal underbelly of Nuremberg until he had identified Moriarty's main agent, gathered enough evidence on him to guarantee that he would spend the rest of his life in prison and delivered it anonymously to the police. After that was done, he stole a car and headed for Italy with both his copies of John's book in his glovebox. Once there, he spent a tense two weeks in Naples, encouraging a gang war that just happened to result in the complete eradication of the gang that had been Moriarty's main Italian branch, and bought himself a copy of John's book in Italian.

On his way to Spain on an extremely uncomfortable coach, he opened his English copy again. He reread the last page, then flipped to the place in the narrative where the last conversation he and John had face-to-face should have been.

_I got a phone call telling me that Mrs. Hudson had been shot, and was in critical condition. I rushed back to Baker Street to see how she was, leaving Sherlock at Barts._

No mention of the argument about whether or not Sherlock should go as well, or the harsh words John had thrown at him. Sherlock hoped that John hadn't felt any guilt over them, then realised that was a false hope. Of course he had. All that he could do was hope that John would forgive him for the smaller sin of letting him leave like that, when he knew it was likely to be for good, as well as the larger one of having lied about his death.

He was counting rather heavily on John being as forgiving with this as he had been with so many other things. Perhaps it would be a good idea to offer something first.

He turned back to the dedication page and pulled a pen out of his backpack. He thought for a moment, then wrote, _Friends protect you. Sometimes that means the truth has to be sacrificed, and over larger things than whether or not a new jumper is hideous._

_I hope that this book will have a sequel sooner rather than later._

He left it unsigned. There were more than enough clues there – too many, really, but Sherlock couldn't bring himself to change the words. It seemed unlikely that anyone but John would read them.

When he reached Malaga, he parcelled the book up and asked a helpful woman to address it for him, claiming an injured hand. As he posted it, he found himself wishing that he could return to Baker Street as easily as the parcel was going to. 

He bought himself two new copies of _The Great Detective_ , one in Spanish and one in English, and then set about bringing down Moriarty's chief extorter, who had retired to the Costa del Sol after the death of her boss.

Less than a week later, as the authorities descended on the woman's villa and Sherlock watched from a near-by English pub, dressed in a t-shirt he was hoping he'd have the chance to burn later, he received a text from Mycroft.

_The change in J will be noticeable to your enemies as well as your allies._

Sherlock felt himself smile. It felt unfamiliar on his face.

_I have very few of the former left_ , he replied, as the extorter was put inside a police car in handcuffs.

He had one last stop to make, in Bruges (would they have John's book in Flemish as well as French? He could but hope), and then there would only be one strand of Moriarty's web left to sever. To do that, he'd have to return to London. 

Well, he had it on good authority that it had missed him. He'd have to see if that would come in the form of a punch or a hug – either would be equally welcome, as long as there was tea as well, and a space on the shelf to put his new collection of books.


End file.
